Home

I want to leave the unwelcoming loveseats not huge couches you can lounge on,

laughing with family and friends squished onto every spot, squawking over a game.

I want to leave behind square complexes to go back to pretty lanes filled with color,

pictures lining hallways to stare at for hours, filled with character for the people they decorate.

I'm getting rid of lilies and poinsettias, but never cat mint, for cats that love to roll and bite.

I want to leave peaches and mangoes, tastes that never felt right.

But never Graceling Realm or Percy Jackson, tastes that lead me to my home in my mind.

I leave behind Christmas, and give all my joy to Yule and Halloween;

and bestow blessings on Denver and Manhattan, both welcoming homes.

I want to leave memories of housewives, and “Boys will be boys.”

Words and phrases that do us disservices, ones that we can shape better.

I'm leaving anxious childhood memories, that fill me with dread

over things that I can never control, and not small tokens from travels, mementos to forever

remind me, and never not once the cliffs that fill my memories with happy family.